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The Alternative Information Center is a binational organisation to promote the human and national rights of the Palestinian people and a just peace for Palestinians and Israelis based on progressive principles and respect for international law.

Last summer's social protests exposed the cracks and contradictions of the
current economic and political order. The voices of the protests were not
limited to those of the traditional middle classes. These contradictions
are opportunities that call us to promote change and not to stand idly by.
A critical overview of the protest, with the aim of contributing to its
renewal.

Have you ever heard commercials in the middle of a demonstration,
while breathing tear gas? There are some corporations who do not give
up even a single valuable moment of a listening audience, even
demonstrators under a tear gas attack...

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In February 2010, Israel's minister of foreign affair, head of the right-wing party "Yisrael Beiteinu”, proposed requiring a loyalty oath as a condition of Israeli citizenship. Those who refuse - Arab or Jewish - would have their citizenship revoked. Read our own version...

Acre facing the New and Old Colonizers

Shalom: Don't Be Ashamed to Say Judaization of Galilee

In July 2011, the military Yeshiva "Northern Wind" celebrated the
opening of its fancy new building in Acre. Silvan Shalom, Deputy Prime
Minister and Minister of Development for the Negev and the Galilee,
sent the yeshiva his blessings: "The establishment of the yeshiva
in the city," said Shalom, "helps in strengthening the drive for the
Judaization of the Galilee. There is nothing to be ashamed of in
saying this! We want Jews to come and live in the Galilee and in the
Negev, and you are helping me realize the vision I believe in." There
is already a "non-Jewish" majority in the Galilee, Shalom said in a
radio interview a few months earlier. Minister Shalom left no room for
doubt: in the eyes of the Israeli government the Palestinian citizens
of the Negev and the Galilee are a danger, and in order to cope with
it, it is necessary to allot resources and settle Jews in these
areas.

For this purpose the government has found loyal allies who do the work
on the ground: settlers who have moved from the occupied territories
to the mixed Arab-Jewish cities in Israel; city mayors who believe
that the way to cope with hardship and poverty is to exchange the poor
populations with "strong populations", and who have no qualms about
using racist incitement to further their purposes; and finally, the
mainstream gentrifiers, who seek nothing but to advance their
businesses and "urban development." Acre finds itself at the
forefront of this conflict.

Dispossession, Discrimination and Separation

Prior to 1948 the population of Acre numbered some 15,000, only a few
hundred of whom were Jews. Most of the inhabitants lived in the old
city, and a minority lived in the new Arab city established outside
the walls (al-'Imarat or New Acre). In the course of the war most
of the Palestinian inhabitants of the city were expelled; at the war's
end some 3,000 Palestinians crowded into the old city, many of them
refugees from Palestinian villages that had been erased from the
map. New Jewish immigrants from Arab countries arrived in the city,
and by the 1960s the population of the city had stabilized, with
Palestinians comprising about 25% of the inhabitants. Acre was and has
remained a poor city. Since the 1990s many immigrants from the former
Soviet Union have joined the city, and at the same time, given the
city's weak economy and lack of appropriate infrastructure, many
Jewish residents who were able to find work and housing in the north,
left Acre. The Palestinian population of the city grew and today
numbers some 30% of Acre's 53,000 inhabitants.

The Palestinian inhabitants of Acre lost most of their property. In
the old city the Custodian of Absentee Property holds approximately
85% of the houses; 10% are in the hands of Muslim and Christian
religious institutions, and only 5% are in the hands of private
property owners. As it did in other Palestinian cities (Jaffa, Ramle,
Lydda), the Custodian of Absentee Property transferred Palestinian
houses – the houses that belong to refugees to the government housing company Amidar. Hence,
the Palestinian inhabitants of the old city do not own their houses;
they rent them from the government company and live under its constant
supervision.

Acre, the Old City

In 1967 the Israeli government established the Old Acre Development Company. The company was assigned the task of
transforming all of old Acre into a tourist site; till this very day, there is not a single Palestinian citizen on its board of directors. The city was
intended to become a "living museum." The company aimed at emptying
the old city of its Arab inhabitants in order to turn it into a
reconstituted tourist area, similar to what the Company for the
Development of Old Jaffa had managed to bring about in Jaffa: in the
1960s, it turned the old quarter of Jaffa, after emptying the area of
all its Arab inhabitants, into a picturesque "artists' colony" with
close ties to the government.

This was the model for Acre’s future. The poverty-stricken inhabitants
of old Acre, so the company claimed, were an obstacle on the path of
transforming the old city into a tourist haven. The deliberate neglect
of the old city and its infrastructure and the imposition of draconian
restrictions on building and renovations were intended to make the
lives of the inhabitants of the old city impossible. In the 1970s
about one-third of the housing units in the old city were considered
uninhabitable. The Company for the Development of Old Acre tried to
cause the Palestinian inhabitants to leave Acre and move to the
village of Makr, but in the end many families who left Acre returned
to the city. Acre has remained a "mixed city" – like Lod/al-Ludd,
Ramle and Jaffa – and like them continues to suffer from poverty and
hardship, and from a systematic policy of separation and
discrimination.

"To Settle in People's Hearts": From the West Bank into Israel

For the last few years a group of settlers from the occupied
territories have been operating in Acre; they have set themselves the
goal of not only settling beyond the "Green Line" but also "to settle
in people's hearts", that is to struggle to change the character of
Israeli society. The focus of their activity is in the mixed cities –
in Jaffa, Lod/al-Ludd, Ramle and Acre (and also in Upper Nazareth).

Sign: Jews, buy from your brother!

The basic pattern is recognizable: it begins with purchasing
properties and organized settlement activity in Arab neighborhoods,
with massive government aid. The settlers start a campaign for the
strengthening of the "Jewish character" of the city and with a series
of provocations against the Palestinian inhabitants in order to
destroy the fragile fabric of co-existence, to the degree that it
exists. The settlers in the mixed cities are very familiar with the
social problems and exploit them for their purposes. In the face of
the deepening social crisis in Israeli society and the disintegration
of public welfare services, they can offer material aid and donations;
they enter the void that has been created in the poor neighborhoods in
order to win hearts and accumulate power. Their campaigns for
"strengthening Jewish identity" time and again leads to a gradual
escalation in relations with the Palestinian inhabitants, and just
like in the West Bank, each clash serves as a pretext for expanding
the settlements and obtaining additional property.

The pioneers of the organized settlement in Acre were a group of
settlers – members of a religious movement called "Ometz"
("Fortitude", "Courage") – who moved into the eastern neighborhood of
the city in 1997. Their leader hails from the "Shavei Hebron" Yeshiva
– the settler yeshiva established in the heart of Hebron in 1982
that took over the Arab girls' school next to the Hebron market ("Beit
Romano"), and is considered the driving force behind the settlers in
Hebron. Other settlers from the South Hebron Hills joined him. The
leader of the group declared openly that they had come to compensate
for the weakening of the "Jewish character" of Acre caused by the
departure of Jewish families. The initiative to establish the group
was supported by Rabbi Shlomo Eliyahu, the racist rabbi of Safed, who
recently gained notoriety when he exhorted Jews not to rent apartments
in Safed to Arabs.

The rabbi of Acre, Yosef Yashar, is of the same ilk. He announced in a
media interview that "the Arabs are simply occupying us," that is, are
buying apartments, and he continued: "We [the Jews] are losing the
entire western Galilee. They [the Arabs] are coming from the villages
and entering the cities, including Haifa." In 2003 Rabbi Yashar
complained that it was difficult for him to speak his mind openly. The
reporter replied: "It's impossible to say to someone interested in
purchasing an apartment that you can't buy it because you're an
Arab. That would be immediately categorized as racism." And the rabbi
retorted:

"We are going to pay a heavy price because of these principles and
because of our fear to say things clearly and openly. The creeping
Arab occupation is the real problem. We can handle the violence of the
Arab youth."

Acre suffers from a high unemployment rate and half of those who are
employed barely earn the minimum wage. Members of the settlers' group
were well aware of the economic distress and began to distribute food
packages, thus winning the hearts and minds of the poor Jewish
neighborhoods. From the fenced-in complex they established in the
eastern neighborhood they run school programs for "strengthening of
Jewish identity."

The settlers, acting in an organized manner to conquer the city,
project their own pattern of activity upon the Palestinian
inhabitants. They describe them as part of an organized conspiracy to
conquer the city from the Jews, and spread the view that the Arab
residents of Acre are "invaders" entering the Jewish
neighborhoods. Many have forgotten the fact that many Palestinians
lived in the new neighborhoods of Acre before 1948, and that the
eastern neighborhoods sprang up on the Palestinian village of
Manshiya, most of whose inhabitants became refugees.

The "Northern Wind" Yeshiva, Acre

The second active branch of the settlers is the military yeshiva
"Northern Wind," which was established in 2003 in the Wolfsohn
Neighborhood, a neighborhood most of whose residents are Arabs. The
yeshiva numbers some 200 students who combine military service with
Torah study and who wander around the neighborhood with their
weapons. The rabbi of the yeshiva, Yossi Stern, comes from the West
Bank settlement Alon Moreh. The people of "Northern Wind" describe
Acre as a Jewish city which must be returned to its former
glory. Co-existence between Jews and Arabs, declared Rabbi Stern, "is
only a slogan," and Acre, like other Jewish cities, must preserve its
Jewish identity. "Acre today is the Land of Israel ten years hence,"
claimed Stern, hinting at the danger lurking in the increasing number
of Arab inhabitants: "What happens in Acre now is what will happen in
Israel. We are the front guard giving honor to the state, and we must
in every way stand firm and meet the national challenge with honor."

"In order to settle the Land of Israel," explained Stern, "we have to
settle in people's hearts." For this purpose he and his students
engage in "Judaizing" Jewish society, that is in active missionary
work and in a struggle against the Arab inhabitants, who pose a
"demographic danger." Palestinian residents of Acre tell of armed
settlers with knitted yarmulkas roaming around the neighborhoods and
sowing fear wherever they go. The website of the religious youth
movement "Bnei Akiva," to which the "Northern Wind" yeshiva belongs,
affirms that this is indeed their intention: "The yeshiva students
project power, determination and confidence in everything related to
the Jewish future of the city," they strengthen the Civil Guard and
operate the "Jewish Route" in the old city – a guided tour of the old
city which completely ignores its Palestinian, Islamic and Christian
history, and instead offers a purified Jewish version.

As the fire breaks out: the pogrom and the expulsion

In the burned house, October 2008; photo: Oren Ziv, ActiveStills

In October 2008, the tensions in Acre exploded. A tragic incident
between neighbors during Yom Kippur was seized upon by settlers and
right wingers, who incited against the Arab residents (see the
detailed report here). What
happened afterwards can only be described as an organized pogrom with
thousands of participants. The clashes focused on the new city of Acre
– the eastern neighborhood and the Wolfsohn neighborhood. In the
northern neighborhoods, where Palestinians live alongside Jews,
rioters gathered in the streets, shouted "Death to Arabs" and attacked
Arab houses. Fourteen Palestinian apartments were attacked, some of
which were set afire, and the inhabitants were forced to flee their
homes.

Palestinian residents of the mixed neighborhoods in the new city
relate that, in the course of the riots, the attack on Arabs was very
targeted: "Dozens of buses transporting national-religious people in
knitted yarmulkas descended on the neighborhood; they got off the
buses, divided into groups and headed toward the houses. They knew
where Palestinian families lived. They stood outside the houses in big
groups and started shouting racist slogans: 'Death to Arabs,' 'We'll
burn you, expel you…' This lasted for a few days. There were also
Jewish residents of these neighborhoods who came down and said: 'The
time has come – the Arabs must be sent to the old city or to Gaza.'"

Acre, residents, October 2008; photo: Oren Ziv, ActiveStills

Much was written at the time about the events in Acre. What evaded
media coverage were the far-reaching consequences: The temporary
evacuation of the families became an actual eviction. The 14
Palestinian families who were expelled and tried to return to their
homes were met with a wall of resistance. The police refused to
guarantee their safety if they returned, while the municipality
reneged on its responsibility and offered the families to leave the
neighborhood for alternative housing. Families who had lived in
spacious private houses were offered small, crowded
apartments. Families who had lived in public housing were forced to
leave behind furnished apartments and received small, empty
apartments. Most of the evicted gave in. Only a few families tried to
return to their houses.

Johayna Seifi, a social activist from Acre, describes how the
activists accompanied one of the evicted families back to their small
neighborhood apartment. The police warned that they could not
guarantee their safety, but the activists insisted: "We arrived, and
in the stairwell we met two Jewish couples. They told us that they had
been sent by the public housing company Amidar to see the apartments
that had been evacuated by the Arab tenants. 'We have been living in
public housing under very crowded conditions for years,' they said,
'and are waiting for our turn, waiting for an apartment to become
available. We are on the waiting list and don't really have a
chance. There is no available public housing. Just now Amidar called
us and said to go and see the apartment.'"

Johayna continues: "One of the two couples left immediately; they
didn't want to see the apartment. The second couple, whose economic
situation was very difficult, asked just to go up and see the
apartment. And this is the scene: We – the activists, the evicted
family and the couple – go up, and in the meantime they tell us about
their children. We are crowded together in a small elevator on whose
walls are written "Death to Arabs." We all try to ignore it. We reach
the apartment and a lot of neighbors surround us – all looking. The
daughter of the Palestinian family we accompanied opens the door to
her apartment with shaking hands – and then she says to the couple: I
don't want you to enter the house. That's how we returned the family
to their home, but they didn't last in the neighborhood and in the end
they left. Only three Arab families remained in the neighborhood."

Gentrification and Dispossession

Alongside the ideological settlers with their blatant nationalist and
anti-Arab agenda, the old city is undergoing a process of
gentrification that is changing its character. Acre mayor Shimon
Lankry openly promotes the process: like many other Israeli mayors he
believes that the solution to the hardship of the poor lies in getting
rid of them and bringing in a "strong population." He is investing the
city's meager resources in developing a boardwalk in old Acre and in
attracting investors to develop Acre's tourist potential. Under his
leadership a tennis center with 13 courts was established in this poor
city. The new infrastructure is not intended for Acre’s real, existing
residents, Jews and Arabs. It is intended for the new residents who
will come – if they come. And in the meanwhile, the welfare system
ignores the needs of the inhabitants.

In the military neighborhood "Naot-Yam"

On the other hand, the Acre municipality is very proud of the new
neighborhood whose construction began in 2006 – a gated community of
private houses for military personnel and their families (read here
about neighborhoods like this all over Israel). Anyone walking around
the Naot-Yam neighborhood, amid the private homes surrounded by walls,
would never know that they were in Acre. The neighborhood was built
with massive state aid: with funding from the Defense Ministry and the
support of Prime Ministers Ariel Sharon and Ehud Olmert and the
Minister for the Development of the Negev and the Galilee at the time
– Shimon Peres.

The military personnel received huge tax reductions and in turn
obligated themselves not to sell their apartments for five years, in
order to "strengthen the city with a high quality population." With
government aid like this, the temptation is to take advantage of the
benefits, sell, and make a profit. Acre Mayor Shimon Lankri calls the
residents of the neighborhood "pioneers" and referred to them as "the
pride of the city."

The "Northern Wind" Yeshiva and next to it the checkpoint at the entrance of the military neighborhood

The military neighborhood in Acre is an eye-opening example of how
nationalist dispossession and gentrification go hand in hand in
Israel. The residents of Ne'ot-Yam went ahead and built, without a
permit, electronic checkpoints at the entrance to their neighborhood
and surrounded it with security cameras. They explained this measure
as preserving "the character of the neighborhood and its safety." The
checkpoint was necessary, they claimed, because as military personnel
they kept military equipment and confidential documents in their
homes. The mayor supported their request, claiming that as a "military
neighborhood" it had "unique qualities." Despite this, the local
planning and building committee of Acre refused the request in January
2010.

In response, the military personnel announced that their struggle for
the approval of the checkpoints was not over – and they had good
reasons for optimism. A member of the neighborhood committee explained
that it would be a mistake to damage the "high quality Jewish
immigration to the city of Acre." The pressure succeeded and in June
2010 the municipal committee retroactively approved the construction
of the checkpoints. When we visited the place in September 2011 the
checkpoints stood at the entrance to the neighborhood and operated
unhindered.

While in the new city the fenced-in community of military personnel
was established, in the old city the public housing company Amidar,
which rents the property of the 1948 Palestinian refugees to
Palestinian residents, is furthering the process of
dispossession. Amidar makes use of tactics well known from other
cities: The company approaches the residents, many of whom suffer from
economic hardship, demanding that they arrange their status and make
back payments which, according to the company, they owe retroactively
from 1948. If they cannot, they lose their rights and their apartments
are taken from them.

Another method is to initiate a renovation of the old houses, "an
exacting historical restoration," at great expense – and then to send
the bill to the residents, who of course are unable to pay it. In this
way, initiatives to save the old city from deterioration and to
renovate the buildings can turn into a curse for the inhabitants. In
other cases, Palestinian home owners, who do not live in Amidar rental
apartments, are required to prove, after 60 years, that they were
living in their houses in Acre on May 15, 1948 – and if they can't,
they are designated refugees subject to the Absentee Property Law of
1950 – and their houses can be confiscated.

To the left – the "students' village" of the "Ayalim Foundation"
in a building renovated with public money in the old city; to the
right – a Palestinian home

At the same time the Company for the Development of Old Acre is
proceeding apace with the Judaization of the old city. They publish
tenders that the Arab residents of the old city – of whom it is
estimated that some 40% live on social security payments – have
virtually no chance of winning. In the meanwhile an unknown number of
houses in the old city have been handed over to the "Ayalim"
Foundation, which is establishing a "students' village" for Jews only,
and publicly declares that its purpose is to foster Jewish
settlement. The organization's patrons are the Jewish Agency and the
American Zionist billionaire David Merage (one of the architects of
the detailed development plans for the Negev). The organization
performs social work in the city and is the means for implementing the
settlement project. Wandering around the old city it is impossible not
to discern the huge gap between the renovated houses of the "Ayalim"
people and the houses of the Palestinian inhabitants surrounding them.

Thus, far from the public eye, an unknown number of properties,
including houses of historical value, have been transferred from hand
to hand. In response to the protest of Palestinian residents of Acre
that the company puts up for sale important pieces of real estate in
the old city without notifying them of the tenders, the CEO of the
company claimed that there was no need to give priority to Acre
residents in the company's public biddings. But when asked about the
transfer of real estate in the city to organizations close to the
government, the CEO revealed the following procedure: "In the past we
transferred properties to the Jewish Agency, which is exempt from the
obligation to offer houses in open public biddings, and the Jewish
Agency passed on the properties to, among others, an organization like
Ayalim."

The activities of the Company for the Development of Old Acre fit in
well with those of the private entrepreneurs. For example, Uri
Yermias, who owns a famous fish restaurant in Acre, bought a number of
houses in the old city and is turning them into boutique
hotels. Residents tell of entrepreneurs who make offers they can't
refuse. The market mechanism is at work here – and the market inclines
to the benefit of the rich and those close to power. Yermias bought
the building where the hotel will be from the development authority –
the institution that maintains the "absentee property," the houses of
the Palestinian refugees, and offers them up for sale.

Entrepreneurs, who have the capital needed to renovate old buildings
and the connections necessary to win tenders, jump at the bargains and
buy them up. This is how things work, not only in Acre, but in Haifa
(in Wadi Salib, for example) and other places as well. Here is how Uri
Yermias describes his purchase:

He approached the Company for the Development of Old Acre and the CEO
Dudu Harari recommended that he look at a building located not far
from his restaurant. "He sent the guy with the keys with me. I saw it
and said 'I want it.' I felt elated," says Yarmias. "I don't believe
in karma, but something inside me told me that this was the place." We
are talking about two buildings – the Shukri building and the WIZO
building, that were leased to him for generations so he could turn
them into a boutique hotel. The buildings will be connected by a
bridge and an external elevator will be installed. The hotel will have
12 suites with beautiful painted ceilings, a small restaurant and bar
for guests, a renovated Turkish bath, and a roof veranda that will be
used as a sundeck during the day and for barbeques in the
evening. (Ha'aretz, 7.4.2006)

And thus, amidst all the hardship, he will build himself a "boutique
hotel." This is a pattern of development that undermines the local
community. Its negative consequences, writes city planner Dr. Galia
Ben-Shitreet, have been pointed out in numerous studies: "The
evacuation and uprooting of inhabitants for the purpose of developing
tourist sites, the rise in the prices of land, food and fuel for the
local population; many of the facilities that serve the tourists, such
as golf courses and luxury hotels, are inaccessible to the local
population, often out of bounds for the local community." She also
mentions in this context the development of "reality tours," tours in
poor neighborhoods.

The concept of Acre as a "living museum," where it is possible to
observe the "natives" as if they were remnants of a former era, has
not disappeared. "Part of the authenticity of the house and part of
the contrast" between the street and the historic Shukri building that
will become a boutique hotel, says Yermias, "is that it's like 100 or
200 years ago – the same women peeling garlic at the entrance to the
house and the children playing with the same ball."

Khan al-'Umdan

In the meantime, the highlight of the public-private gentrification is
the leasing of Khan al-'Umdan, one of the most important historical
sites of Acre. In 2008 the Company for the Development of Old Acre
leased it to a Jewish entrepreneur from England so that he too could
turn it into a boutique hotel. The residents of Acre were not asked
their opinion and the company ignored the protests of Palestinian
social activists. Now the residents of the houses next to the Khan
fear for their fate. They have good reason: The Company for the
Development of Old Acre now has a plan to sell Khan al-Shuna as well
and turn it into a hotel.

The secretary of the company explains that, there, "it's possible to
build two more floors, but it would require the evacuation of the
tenants." A wealthy Arab entrepreneur also built a hotel in a
historical asset in the city. How easy it is to privatize "public
assets" after they have been robbed from the underdog community -
buildings that were part of their tradition and the fabric of their
lives.

Ma'ariv reports on the plan to turn Acre into a "living museum", August 11, 1964

The similarity between Jaffa and Acre doesn't end here. The mayor is
promoting the establishment of an artists' quarter on the Acre
seashore, while the Israel Lands Authority submitted a grandiose plan
in 2008 that included drying out large areas of the sea in order to
build residential, tourist and resort buildings that would include
more than 4,000 apartment units. The plan was partially blocked by
pressure from the Society for the Protection of Nature and the UNESCO
committee in Israel, and instead a more modest plan was approved. This
plan too promotes turning the old city into a tourist site geared
toward "strong populations" and building apartment units for sale to
foreign residents.

This is what development that undermines the local population looks
like: Beautiful apartments on the sea shore that no Acre resident can
buy, just like in Jaffa. This is "development" that is not geared
toward the benefit of the inhabitants living in the city, Jews and
Arabs, but toward the benefit of future settlers, real estate
investors and tourists. There are good reasons to rise up and oppose
this process – before it's too late.